“I give joy through sewing”: A 73-year-old volunteer sews clothes for vulnerable people in the Mykolaiv region

Svitlana Putria, aged 73, is a volunteer seamstress at the Yuzhnoukrainsk City Centre, part of the Mykolaiv regional branch of the Ukrainian Red Cross. Despite her age and being classified in the second disability group, she believes that her mission to help others is far from complete. The woman shared her story with the Suspilne correspondents.

For the past six months, Svitlana Putria has been repairing clothes for local residents. At the age of 73, she was inspired to begin volunteering after a dream she had about her deceased elder son.

“I saw my son. I was walking along the road, and he was standing in a meadow—it was green and beautiful. He didn’t even turn to face me. I saw him and thought, ‘Oh, God, I’m going to run and kiss him and then come back.’ He stood with his back to me, half-turned, showing me where the road was. There was a construction site in the background. It was as if he wasn’t physically speaking but mentally conveying, ‘You still have so much work to do,’ “ shares Svitlana.

Later, Svitlana Boiko, Head of the Voznesensk branch of the Mykolaiv regional branch of the Ukrainian Red Cross, invited her to join the association as a volunteer seamstress.

“We invited her to come to us; we are open every day. Sometimes we drink tea, and sometimes we just talk. She started coming to us gradually, every day. Then we remembered that we had a sewing machine and that she used to provide this service to the public. So we asked her, ‘Would you like to volunteer with us?’ She agreed,” says Svitlana Boiko.

Svitlana Putria works four hours a day. The volunteer tailor expresses her happiness at being able to remain useful.

“Here, I can sit and do a good deed for people. A woman in her 70s brought me some trousers, saying, ‘These are too long for me; please shorten them.’ I measured how much to cut. By the time I finished, the person had already left, but she felt happy knowing she had been helped and that she would be able to wear these trousers. When I see that I can do something nice for someone to make them happy, it gives me strength and a desire to live and bring joy to others.”

Svitlana helps not only local residents but also the military by sewing underwear for wounded soldiers.

“My friends have already brought me fabric, whatever they had. I wish we could send at least a hundred pieces to the Mykolaiv hospital, so they would have something to change into. They tear them up, put on clean ones, and that’s it. Well, at least this is how we can help,” the woman says.

Svitlana became interested in sewing when she was 11 years old, after she had cut her own dress.

“My mum bought fabric and made me a dress, but my dad said, ‘It needs to be longer.’ So she made a long one. I came to school, and the kids were looking at me; it was the fifth grade. I arrived wearing something that didn’t quite fit, and I felt embarrassed, but my dad had insisted,” says Svitlana.

Then the history teacher advised Svitlana to cut the dress and soak it, telling her mother that the fabric had shrunk from the water.

“I came home, cut off a piece, hemmed it, soaked it, and hung it up. I hid the fabric under the mattress. When my mother came and looked at the dress, it was hemmed, as well as an 11-year-old could manage. She took the dress to my grandmother and said, ‘What should I do with it?’ My grandmother looked at it and said, laughing, ‘Bless the child; this is her future profession,’” the seamstress recalls.

After graduation, Svitlana received her fifth category as a seamstress and worked in the profession for her entire life.

Article by Суспільне новини.